1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to an apparatus and method for providing information by using a caller phone number, and more particularly, to an apparatus and method for providing additional information regarding a caller phone number to allow a user to identify a caller corresponding to the caller phone number that is not registered in a phone directory.
2. Description of the Related Art
Recently, with popularization of portable devices, various additional services such as a caller IDentification (ID) service and a message call service, in addition to basic voice communication and text and voice message transmission services, have been provided to users of the portable devices. The message call service is a voice message service for converting input text to voice of a person through a Text-to-Speech (TTS) system and sending the converted voice to a counterpart user. Herein, the caller ID service displays, on a screen of a portable device, a phone number or a name of a caller who is calling a user of the portable device. The caller ID service allows the user to identify the phone number or name of the caller, and thus to avoid unwanted calls.
Generally, when a call is received, if the call is received from a phone number that has been previously registered in a phone directory, a name stored corresponding to the phone number is displayed, such as illustrated in FIG. 1A, allowing the user to easily identify a caller. However, if there isn't any name corresponding to the caller phone number stored in the phone directory, only the caller phone number is displayed, such as illustrated in FIG. 1B.
If there isn't any name corresponding to the caller phone number stored in the phone directory, and thus only the caller phone number is displayed, the user may not be able to easily identify the caller merely with the caller phone number. As a result, the user may answer the call without knowing whether the call comes from an acquaintance the user has not registered in the phone directory or the call is an advertising call or a voice phishing call. As such, a conventional caller ID service fails to provide a service that assists a user's reasonable judgment in avoiding unwanted calls, such as in case of phone fraud.
Moreover, for example, when a Social Network Service (SNS) application that interworks with the phone directory, such as Kakao Talk, is used, a phone number may be automatically added to a friend list of the application. In this case, even a caller who the user does not know well is added to the friend list. Therefore, through this automatic interworking, a picture or personal information that the user does not want to provide to the caller may be inadvertently exposed to the caller.
The above information is presented as background information only to assist with an understanding of the present invention. No determination has been made, and no assertion is made, as to whether any of the above might be applicable as prior art with regard to the present invention.